incubator is set up

[smeagel]

Ok, I set up my incubator as per Jeff's recomendations. A rubbermaid lined with styrofoam and a plastic lineing over the styrofoam. I watched Dr. Sewards video and the Sutherlands use a piece of glass as the top of their egg box. My question is could i use the glass as the top of my incubator as well or will the heat loss be too great thus making the incubator heat source work too hard. I would like to be able to look at the eggs withou opening the incubator lid and loosing heat, again making the heat source work too hard. Any suggestions or opinions would be appreciated. Thanx.

[Jeff_Favelle]

Glass loses heat almost as fast as no lid at all.

[smeagel]

alrighty than insulated lid it is. what about a glass lid on the egg container?

[Jeff_Favelle]

Yep, that would work fine. Most people use that.

[smeagel]

Ok, my temps have leveled off in the incubator at 92.5 That sounds a tad high to me but I would like to know what the experts think.

[smeagel]

well, now i've checked several times, and the temp fluctuates between 89.1 and 92.5. Is there anyway that i can get the temp more stable?

[Jeff_Favelle]

Too high. Aim for 90F. Add a brick, more water, gel packs, more subtrate, etc etc etc. Anything to act as a heat sink (temp. moderator). That should eliminate fluctuations IF your incubator is insulated well. If not, then that's your problem and you need to insulate it better. If it has a proper thermostat, then there's no way the temps should fluctuate.

[mykee]

If the air temp outside your incubator is 89-90-ish, then glass would be an ideal top for your incubator, but if you're producing all the heat that you'll use in the incubator, glass sucks. I think that aiming for 90 is too high though, I had my incubator set at 89 and I was documenting temps between 88.8 and 90.8. I set my incubator to 88 with my Helix and am now getting temps between 88.2 and 90 (liking that much better). Try to keep your temps between 88-91, no higher, no lower.

Keep in mind that even the best thermostat, regardless of what they claim, will have at least a 1 degree variance.

[smeagel]

OK, I added two more bricks and some more water. I am getting temps between 88.9 and 90.2. That sounds pretty good to me.

[mykee]

Better than mine...
Keep an eye on the temperatures over a weeks' time, that should give you a better indication.

[JDouglas]

Ya that sounds pretty good.

I was wondering how long it took for both of your incubators to fluctuate the 1.3F and 1.8F?


I have eggs incubating and have been keeping track of my temps everyday. Here is what I have...

Day 1: 89.3 - 87.2 (after putting eggs in and heating up)
Day 2: 89.3 - 89.0
Day 3: 89.3 - 89.0
Day 4: 89.3 - 89.0
Day 5: 89.3 - 89.0
Day 6: 89.3 - 88.6
Day 7: 89.5 - 88.6 (Opened incubator to add another egg chamber with more eggs)
Day 8: 89.0 - 88.8
Day 9: 89.0 - 88.8
Day 10: 89.0 - 88.8
Day 11: 89.0 - 88.8
Day 12: 89.0 - 88.6
Day 13: 89.0 - 88.6
Day 14: 89.0 - 86.8 (Opened egg chambers to let fresh air in)
Day 15: 89.0 - 88.6
Day 16: 89.0 - 88.6
Day 17: 89.0 - 88.6
Day 18: 89.0 - 88.8
Day 19: 89.0 - 85.9 (Opened egg chamber to let fresh air in)
Day 20: 89.0 - 88.4
Day 21: 89.0 - 83.0 (Opened egg chamber to remove moldy eggs)
Day 22: 89.0 - 88.6
Day 23: 89.0 - 88.4
Day 24: 88.8 - 88.6
Day 25: 89.0 - 88.6
Day 26: 89.0 - 88.6
Day 27: 89.0 - 88.6
Day 28: 89.0 - 88.8
Day 29: 89.0 - 88.8
Day 30: 89.0 - 86.6(Opened egg chambers to let fresh air in)
Day 31: 89.0 - 88.6
Day 32: 89.0 - 88.6
Day 33: 89.0 - 88.6
Day 34: 88.8 - 88.4
Day 35: 88.8 - 88.6
Day 36: 88.8 - 86.1 (Opened egg chamber to let fresh air in)
Day 37: 88.8 - 88.4
Day 38: 88.8 - 88.4
Day 39: 88.8 - 88.4
Day 40: 88.8 - 88.6
Day 41: 88.8 - 88.6

Total Fluctuation: 89.3 - 88.4F or +/- 0.45F
Daily Fluctution AVG = 0.344F or +/- 0.172F
(Not including days when egg chambers were opened to add fresh air or remove bad eggs.)

Recovery time to set point after opening the egg chamber was about 15 minutes.

These temperatures are air temperatures taken with a digital thermometer probe inside the egg chamber. Jaremy

[smeagel]

my temps. spiked to 91.2 today for about 10 minutes. then 2 hours later it was spiking again. what could be causing this? wht can be done to rectify it?

[mykee]

Smeagel; ain't nothing you can do, like I said, even the best digital termometers with probes have their "issues". I would not worry about it. I currently have two probes in each egg box and I get a differential of almost a degree. Go figure.
Jaremy; I've had my incubator running for over two months now, even though I still have nothing in it. I like to test, re-test and re-re-test everything so I can catch a problem before there are eggs in there.

[Jeff_Favelle]

Man, you guys are stressin' ME out! And I NEVER have gotten stressed about incubatin'!! Its the easiest part of the whole dang process!!!

LOL!

[smeagel]

LOL. Jeff. Hope your not pullin your hair out cause of me man!